Mrs WD and I finally finished the Pullet Palace yesterday and moved the birds in. This chicken hobby has been challenging so far - and expensive. I started building the run and coop 14 days ago, figured we'd finish in a week. In my optimism I brought the birds home last Saturday even though the Palace wasn't quite finished. Then the weather turned to crap and we had to finish building it in the garage. It was so crowded and hard to work inside that it took 8 more days. The biggest problem was that it stressed the birds. We would move them to the half-finished coop when we hammered and pounded on the run, then move them to the run to work on the coop. It was dark and noisy even during the day, and it stressed them out to the point that they began pecking each other's tail feathers out. The plan was to move the structures out on the forks on the front of my tractor. Great plan except for one thing. I had not considered that the garage door opening is 6'3" high. The coop is 6'7". We got it out with a lot of manhandling and luck. Got the two units outside and joined by about 4PM so the birds got a couple of hours of fresh air and sunshine. Woke up this morning to cold rain and sleet and the birds huddled in the coop again, probably pecking at each other.
We got 5 birds:
Dot - a Barred Rock
Goldie - Buff Orpington
Ruth - Rhode Island Red
Peare - Australorp
Marie - Comet